from Journal of the American Geriatrics Society
Statins are a first-line class of medications to lower cholesterol and heart attack and stroke in groups of people at increased risk for heart disease. But the medical community has long debated the value of prescribing statins in people who don’t already have high cholesterol or heart disease. New information comes in two studies from Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, published in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society. A group of nearly three-quarters of a million of military veterans was associated with thirty-nine percent lower risk of death and fourteen percent lower risk of a first heart attack or stroke. The health benefit of statins appears even greater in an older population considered frail.